xp_logs | Angelo, Laurie and Amanda, Saturday night

Laurie comes for a visit. Various things are talked around, but Laurie is persuaded that therapy might actually help her in the end.

Laurie knocked on the door to Angelo and...Forge's suite. It'd get easier, she knew that, or at least that's what she'd been told. It didn't help right now though, and every reminder of the fact that Crystal and Forge weren't here just made her want to hit something. It didn't really matter that it was an exceedingly unhelpful reaction to have to a crisis, it was just how she felt.

There was only a slight delay before the door opened, revealing Angelo. He looked a little tired, but not worrisomely so, and mustered a smile from somewhere to greet her. "Hey, Laurie."

"Hi." Laurie replied, fidgeting before looking around to see if Amanda was there. "Can I come in?"

"Sure thing, Laurie!" came Amanda's voice and then the witch herself appeared behind Angelo, raising herself up on her toes and resting her chin on his shoulder for a moment. "I was just making tea. You want some?" she asked, aware that it was going to be up to her to keep things 'normal'.

"Yes please." Laurie replied, tone steadily polite. "How are you two holding up? I didn't think to check before."

Angelo stepped carefully back, letting Laurie pass without treading on Amanda's feet. "We're, uh... holdin' up." The smile had faded even from its previous state, and he let the answer speak for itself.

Keeping her bare feet out from under Angelo's, Amanda gave his arm a brief squeeze before moving back to the kitchen to finish tea preparations. "Have a seat, this won't take long," she said, giving Laurie a reassuring smile. "What about you? You all right? 'S been a rough week."

"I'm good." Laurie replied, the lie so profound in its nature that had this been a fantasy book, small furry creatures of a dark nature would have been born that very instant. As it was, being as this was not a fantasy book, no such thing happened and indeed, she took her seat and smiled somewhat unconvincingly without even a small planet self-destructing anywhere.

Angelo wasn't taken in for a second, but it wasn't as if he'd exactly told the truth himself. He just nodded and settled onto the couch in turn, trying not to notice the things still littered around the room.

With a sigh, Amanda brought three mugs and the milk bottle over, sugar tucked under her arm. "Okay," she said, setting the tea things down and taking a seat of her own next to Angelo. "Can we just cut the shite here? Because I'm not up for carrying the conversation. Not today." She gave Laurie a Look.

"That obvious?" Laurie replied, a small glint of humour twisting her mouth upwards before fading back into the expression she'd warn all week.

It was, unfair of her to make Amanda carry a conversation when she'd been then one to ask to visit, to talk. There was so much that seemed unfair lately, and none of it made any real sense, not that she could see. Despite the colloquial unfairness of the universe and the games of whatever beings happened to be writing this farce that got called 'normal' life. It was enough to make you scream really, or throw things...preferably at non-squishy life filled targets.

"Can't play a player, mate," Amanda said with a wry grin and gave Angelo an apologetic look. "And I've known Angelo way too long to be fooled by the 'I'm good' with that kind of face. And he'll let you get away with it, but I'm a bit of a bitch that way these days. Life's too short." Of course, she'd let Angelo get away with it, but that was because that was Different. Of course.

"Forge and Crystal are dead, and it's not so long ago that we were all thinking we might be dead at any moment. It's...difficult to cope with." Laurie said, taking her mug and placing two sugars in. "I'm, of course, understating the difficulty but saying 'I want to kill things with my bare hands' seems a little dramatic while I'm sitting here and getting ready to drink tea. Especially since I'm meant to be the pacifist."

"Nothin' wrong with feelin' that way sometimes", Angelo said quietly. "Especially now. You thought about spendin' some time with the heavy bags?"

"Yeah. Lorna offered to go with me if I wanted to work out on them. Think I'll take her up on it." Laurie replied, hesitating for a second before going on. "She said that maybe I should talk to Dr Samson as well. I don't know what good talking about it is going to do though. They'll still be dead, and everything else will still have happened."

"Samson's a good bloke," Amanda told her. "And no, he can't make things change, but he can help you with how you react to things, give you ideas on how to cope. I know he helped me a lot when I went to see him, back when I was a student here."

"Me too", Angelo spoke up. "An' you know, if nothin' else... you can yell at him, deservin' or not, an' he won't mind."

"Yelling at people never solved anything." Laurie responded, and then smiled slightly to take the sting out of it. "Sorry, I guess being a brat to people never solved anything either."

Amanda waved away the apology and reached for her tea. "You're not so bad, Laurie, trust me on this one. And while it mightn't solve anything, if something makes you feel better, then it can't hurt." She paused. "Well, as long as it's not drinking until you throw up, doing drugs or going over to the bad guys."

"Could you really see me doing any of those things?" Laurie replied, grinning suddenly at the image of her as a villain. "Jennie would never forgive me if I had that bad a taste in fashion. And drugs or alcohol could be very bad for me, and sort of everyone around me as well. I don't know if I can make someone intoxicated the same way I can make them sober but I'm not sure I really want to experiment on that on."

Angelo laughed quietly. "If you could find someone who wouldn't mind, it might be interestin'. But seriously... gettin' the anger out helps more'n you might think. Just ask Nathan - he goaded me 'til I punched him, once. On purpose."

"Sounds like Nate all right," Amanda said with a chuckle. "He tended towards the physical sort of counselling for a while there."

"Oh?" Laurie asked, curious. She didn't often get a chance to talk about what her teachers had been like before she knew them, and she was almost positive that Mr Dayspring had one of the more interesting histories.

"Just stuff like I just mentioned", Angelo told her with a crooked grin. "An' throwin' me in the lake a couple times when I was bein' dumb."

"People seem to do that a lot around here. I have a feeling that I should probably learn to swim a little better if I ever feel the need to get well and truly gothic." Laurie replied, picking up her tea and taking a sip.

It was somewhat surreal in a way, just moments ago she'd been struggling with everything and yet now, she was sitting here and joking about people being thrown into lakes as therapy. Yet, she couldn't say it wasn't the right thing to be doing, she had a feeling that whatever made you feel like you could go on was what you should be doing.

Maybe she should see Dr. Samson, it couldn't hurt, right?